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Menachem Bluming Muses on What Makes Jews Unique

Jews do odd things sometimes. One example is the known practice of “credit combing.”
Many Jews have a habit of combing through the names at the end of a movie, searching for Jewish names. At each discovery they shine with pride:

This strange practice comes from a very deep place in the Jewish essence. Jews share a spiritual union with each other. If I meet a Jew- it doesn’t matter where, there is an immediate connection, a kinship, a sense of oneness. We are like one vast family, and even closer than that.

If Jews are in the news, we each take it personally. When Israel is being attacked, we feel the pain wherever we are. When a Jew wins a bronze medal in baseball, we all share the victory. And when we pick out a Jewish name in the credits, we get excited.

Maybe other nations do this as well. But I don’t think so. This strong sense of connection makes the Jewish nation unique among other religions.

This is the reason why data cannot apply to the Jewish people. No Jew is only an individual. We are a collective soul, a slice of something bigger than ourselves. We may be a tiny blip on the radar, but we don’t work by the usual rules of demography. Our strength is not measured by our numbers, but by our oneness.

The destiny of the Jewish nation is to be a strong voice of goodness and decency among the family of nations. When we unite with our community and commit ourselves to the shared mission of our people, then we are a formidable existence. Not because we are one billion, but because we are one.